The 7.14.13 Issue

I guess this is intended as a story about a child prodigy and meant to stimulate discussion about whether or not children should be raised like this. For me, however, this is foremost a story about income inequality and about a country (and world) with messed-up priorities. How about using all this wealth to make China a better place for the millions of wage slaves and farmers living in squalid conditions? How about training this boy to become a doctor or scientist rather than a golfer? TOM M, New York, posted on nytimes.com

To people who think that training children at a young age to play golf is child abuse — really? Have you ever played golf? It’s fun. Sure, the training regimen sounds pretty intense, but it’s a given if you want to excel at any sport. What kid would rather go to school than play golf all day? I would have traded places with these Chinese kids in an instant if I had the chance. ALENA ZHU, London, posted on nytimes.com

Always nice to read about an 8-year-old who drives it farther than I. The real reason to fear China. @captainwhacky

I grew up in New York in the ’70s with parents who were artists, in a rent-controlled apartment. When my parents weren’t dancing with Martha Graham or on Broadway, they existed on unemployment. There were no frills, but there was an abundance of riches. We were raised in museums, concerts and art studios. I was not poor, nor was Gaby Hoffmann. Now my own child, raised in Brooklyn, wants to begin a creative career. Where can he use his talents and live affordably? My son may well have to pursue his artistic vision in Cleveland, Detroit, upstate or out West. It’s an uncalculated loss that so many talented people are no longer able to make New York their home. CATHERINE HODES, Brooklyn, posted on nytimes.com

The notion that Manhattan has been somehow pre-empted by the rich is easy enough to believe. But it is countered by a walk through my neighborhood around Herald Square and by my interactions with people of all ages. They seem to have more of the spirit that people miss from the fabled ’80s. STEPHEN C. ROSE, New York, posted on nytimes.com

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I was just in Somalia for a week, flying on the U.N. Humanitarian Air Service route from Nairobi, which stops in Galkayo, Garowe and Bossaso. There are regular commercial routings from Nairobi to Mogadishu as well. Clearly, the Somali diaspora and humanitarian assistance work from NGOs and development agencies are helping to make this air service viable. But Somalia is big. The nation is the size of Texas, with one of the longest coastlines in Africa. Most of the country can be reached only over rough gravel or rubble, accessible by 4x4s or camels. Clearly, air travel is needed to enable the country to rebuild economically and stabilize politically. Someday, there might be hotels on the coast of Puntland and Somaliland, and people will be flying there. MICHAEL ZWIRN, Washington, posted on nytimes.com

Here is a good example of businessmen as unsung heroes providing a useful service. Most people love to hate them when they become rich and successful, but most of business life is about putting everything on the line and struggling for years on the slim chance that you might hit it big. TK, Hoboken, N.J., posted on nytimes.com

When I read Amy Chozick’s portrayal of Jimmy Wales in the Sunday magazine (June 30), I was dismayed by its focus on money and status. The piece seemed to mock Wales for not getting sufficiently rich from Wikipedia, and yet simultaneously criticize him for enjoying his fairly modest fame and fortune. Such a missed opportunity. The purpose of journalism is to help people better understand our world, and one way to do that is to intelligently question conventional wisdom. Instead, Chozick’s piece seems to uncritically accept and perpetuate the narrowest, most pedestrian possible perspective on the Internet: that its main utility is to make people rich, and that anybody who doesn’t exploit it for that purpose is perhaps an oddball, and a bit suspect. SUE GARDNER, Executive Director, Wikimedia Foundation

Always nice to read about
an 8-year-old who drives it farther
than I. The real reason to fear
China. @captainwhacky about young
golfers in China, via Twitter; E-MAIL letters to magazine@nytimes
.com or post comments at nytimes.com
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A version of this article appears in print on July 28, 2013, on Page MM8 of the Sunday Magazine with the headline: The 7.14.13 Issue. Today's Paper|Subscribe